


Paper Boats

by Mercury Starlight (WoolandWater)



Category: The Young Ones (TV 1982)
Genre: Angst, Bombing, Earn Your Happy Ending, Eye Trauma, Grieving, Hurt/Comfort, Multi, Multiple Dimensions, Post-Series, Self-Harm, Slow Death, Temporary Character Death, brief respite, creepy child?, dimensional shifts, dreams/visions, first-person fatal car accident, love & mobsters verse, makeshift cremation, quick death, reluctant euthanasia, self-torture, trapped in a room
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-26
Updated: 2016-08-16
Packaged: 2018-07-26 20:19:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 16,070
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7588633
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WoolandWater/pseuds/Mercury%20Starlight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The house has a typical shift to another era. But this shift doesn't seem all that typical to Vyvyan, and it proves far more dangerous than usual.</p><p>Dark, dark angst, with a surprisingly satisfying and sweet ending. But y'all are going to have to earn that shit, and it's going to get worse before it gets better. Just rest-assured, folks who avoid major character death, when I say "temporary" character death, I totally mean it. Sort of. You'll see.</p><p>Post-Love & Mobsters Verse</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Folding

_There's something wrong with the garden._

Vyvyan stood at the bedroom window, looking down at it with concern. It was bothering him, but he just couldn’t put his finger on what was wrong. It didn’t help that he’d woken up out of sorts. It wasn’t only the garden – _everything_ felt off. From the moment he’d opened his eyes, things felt... _different_. Heavier somehow, perhaps darker. _It sounds_ _…different outside._ He couldn’t hear the motorway even though it was only a few blocks off. The rest of the city’s landscape beyond the garden was somehow different as well. _Was that building always there?_  Everything was... _wrong_. Eerie and off-kilter. It was that feeling one sometimes got when waking up from an afternoon nap that had lasted a bit too long, only magnified a thousand times. There was a horrible sense of foreboding, like nothing he’d ever felt. _Something's going to happen. I don't know what or when, but it's going to be_ _…_

He shivered.

Rick came up behind him, wrapped his arms around him, and rested his sharp little chin on Vyvyan’s shoulder. _Mmmm, good morning, poof._ Vyvyan leaned into him, but didn’t take his eyes off the garden. What _was_ it? Why wouldn’t it come to him?

“You’ve been staring out of that window since you got up,” Rick said, “What’s so interesting down there?”

“Does the garden look different to you?”

Rick looked out on the garden and thought.

“No…well, I mean, Neil’s just fallen into that hole, has that always been there?”

Vyvyan blinked. Rick was right – there WAS a hole, and Neil had indeed just fallen into it. It wasn’t only a hole – it appeared to be a shallow stairwell, perhaps only a few feet into the ground. But _that_ was what was wrong. Rick’s stargazing spot was no longer a simple faceless, concrete slab. The slab was still there, certainly, but there were steps leading down to what appeared to be a _door_.

The once bomb shelter was now once _again_ a bomb shelter.

 _Well, the house has shifted. Backwards? Ah well, either way, it'll right itself eventually._ _It always does. But then why does it feel so_ _…different?_

Vyvyan bolted out of the room and down the stairs, for some reason feeling an urgent need to see the shelter up close. Rick followed behind with curiosity. They passed Mike, casually reading his paper at the table, as though nothing was amiss at all. Mike's paper had a picture of Churchill on the cover, yet it somehow sat right beside the latest issue of Men’s Life, freshly delivered. Vyvyan threw open the garden door and rushed over to where Neil was now standing and rubbing his arm absent-mindedly.

“Hi guys,” Neil said, looking at the shelter with curiosity, “Look at this!”

Vyvyan pushed past him and opened the door to the shelter – it had no lock, but the door was heavy, fortified. It was pitch black inside, and he lit his lighter to look for a switch. When he found one and pressed it, a row of fluorescent lights sprang to life and revealed the room.

It was long and narrow, shelves lining both walls, and two bunk beds opposite the door. The shelves were fully stocked with canned goods, cans which looked essentially new. Below each shelf were several jugs of water. The whole thing looked as though it had been stocked and sealed just yesterday. That wasn't particularly surprising, but it was somehow disturbing, in a way he couldn't place and had no words for. It felt.. _prepared_ for them. A bomb shelter. It reminded him of the atom bomb, the one that landed in the kitchen once. He'd been so eager to blow it up. _I wanted to see what would happen, I knew everything would be put right in the morning. But this isn't like the bomb. This is wrong, and I hate it. There isn't any reason, but it is and I do. No, not the shelter exactly, only_ _…fuck, where’s my bloody head?_

Vyvyan stormed out of the shelter and slammed the door behind him.

“What’s the matter, Vyv?” Rick asked, and Vyvyan waved him away.

“Nothing, never mind. When’s breakfast, Neil?”

“Oh, I haven’t started it yet, I was out here picking a few herbs for the lentil porridge.”

“Oh for Moz’s sake, Neil, it’s nearly lunchtime and you haven’t even started breakfast?” Rick and Neil headed back into the kitchen, Rick berating Neil the whole way. Vyvyan watched them go, absent-minded, before looking around the garden. Was anything else out of place? Not that he could see. He opened the back gate and looked out on the alleyway behind the house. _Fuck-all back here._ Even the bins in the back were modern, he could still see a bit of one of his magazines poking out of the lid. He closed the gate again and headed back into the house.

_I'm imagining things. I slept funny, or I had an odd dream or something, but everything's fine, business as usual around this house. Get a grip on yourself, you daft bastard._

*****

_In the dream, he was driving. Neil was in the passenger seat, why was Neil in his car? Oh, they were on a job. It was unfortunate, but necessary. Neil was blathering on about something to do with multiple dimensions when the lorry on the other side of the road decided to jump the median. Everything shifted into slow-motion, but there was somehow still no time - he felt frozen, watching it approach without really registering it, and then it hit and the world spun and metal crunched, and if he was honest it was actually rather fun for a bit - but then the spinning and crunching didn't stop, until it did and the front bumper of the lorry was pressing windshield glass into his face. That didn't stop either, until it did and there was nothing._

_There was nothing at all._

*****

Vyvyan woke to a loud, mechanical wail, some sort of siren. He reached for Rick and found the spot beside him was empty. He lifted his tired head and saw him through bleary eyes, standing at the window and looking out with interest.

“Wha?” he managed.

Rick looked back at him and smiled, “Vyv, come look at this!” He looked back out, peering into the night sky, “There are so many planes! They have symbols on them I think. I can’t make them out, it’s too dark. I think there must be a blackout or something, nobody's lights are on. There's a poem in there, I know it! Aeroplane, o aeroplane, sailing above the dark sea of the city…”

Vyvyan sat up, feeling disoriented and slow. That feeling was back and stronger than ever. His head was still clouded with sleep, and he couldn’t quite get hold of the present. He’d been dreaming about something important, and somehow terrifying, but he couldn’t remember it anymore. All he had left was the feeling, melding with the sense of impending doom bearing down on him. Rick's yammering was distracting him further, and the noise he couldn’t quite place continued, screaming over everything in a lilting cadence. That sound was familiar. It was so…very…

The sudden whistling sound growing ever louder underneath the air raid siren _Yes. That._ made everything click, and his sleepy, irritated expression snapped into horror. He only had time to scream, “Get down!” before the window imploded, showering the bedroom, and Rick, with thousands of ragged shards.

_Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!_

The house shook violently for what seemed like forever. Vyvyan had shielded his eyes out of instinct, and as he lowered his arm the house groaned and shook again, as if complaining about the blast. _Oh god, oh fuck._ He looked over at Rick, who was lying on the ground a couple of feet from the now destroyed bedroom window. He sat up, disoriented. A long shard of glass stuck out of his left eye, but his expression said he hadn't registered that yet.

Vyvyan shifted into medic mode immediately, shoving away everything else, even as fear began poking at the edges of his awareness. He leapt out of bed, ignoring the shards that shoved their way into his feet. Rick looked up at him blankly, as if he couldn't quite grasp what was happening. Besides the shard in his eye, half his face was cut to ribbons - it seemed he'd turned toward Vyvyan's shout just enough to miss the right side.

"Vyvyan," he said, with eerie calm, "Have I got a great whopping shard of glass in my eye?"

"Yes," Vyvyan said, kneeling at his side and assessing the rest of the damage.

Rick nodded, "I thought so. Should I be…concerned about that at all?"

"I should think so, yes," Vyvyan lifted Rick's glass-filled left arm to inspect the shard that had made its way into his side. Vyvyan wasn't sure if there was any organ damage, but at least it had missed his ribs. A chill went down his spine. _It's in the same spot. Nearly the exact same spot._ The scar tissue in his own side gave a sympathetic dull throb. _Why does this all feel so_ _…dire? Is this another one of those days that sticks?_ He shook his head to clear it, and took a deep breath.

"That shard in your eye is going to start to hurt in a moment, not to mention the one in your side, and the ones on your forearm, so I think I had better get some painkiller into you before you start squealing, girly."

"You know, I was just wondering if it should hurt. I think…oh yes, it's beginning to smart a bit now."

Vyvyan cast about for his medical bag, entirely unsure where he'd left it last.

"Er, Vyvyan. It's beginning to hurt quite a lot now, actually. Vyv…Vyv, augh Vyv it's…it hurts! Vyv! Augh! Augh!" His protests dissolved into painful, whimpering yelps.

Vyvyan finally found his bag and practically ripped it apart trying to get inside. It was half empty, and held only a few needed tools.

“NEIL!!!”

There was a long pause, and for a brief moment he worried something similar had happened to his nurse. Meanwhile, Rick's yelps were turning to a somewhat constant wail.

“Hey guys, my window exploded, did yours?" Neil opened the door, disoriented and half-dressed, but apparently unscathed from the blast, "Oh wow. Heavy.”

“Yes,” Vyvyan said, annoyed and urgent, “Very. I need as much gauze as you can find, a hypo, some morphine and the tongs to start. And hurry it-“ but as he looked behind him, he found Neil was already gone. Rick's wail intensified.

"Look poof, I know it bloody hurts, but we'll get you good and stoned in just a moment and you'll be right as rain," Vyvyan lied. He was going to lose that eye. There was no question about it, no hope for it, it was _gone_. Vyvyan was certain this wasn't an injury that would conveniently heal itself. He didn't know why or how he knew it, but he was absolutely certain - as certain as he was that whatever he'd been dreading all day had happened…was perhaps still happening, "So in the meantime, you'd better just shut up about it."

He rubbed Rick's back reassuringly until his wails died back to whimpering. Then Neil returned with the requested materials and the two went to work.

The morphine began to do its work and Rick's whimpers faded to whining sighs, then finally to silence. Vyvyan looked at him with genuine pity as he placed his materials back in his bag.

"Good news is, that morphine'll keep the edge off. Bad news is, we're going to have to pull those shards out, it's going to hurt like hell, and there's nothing I can do about that. Neil, run and fetch me a-"

He was cut off by the loud, close whistle of an impending bomb. All three froze for a moment, only a moment, as the sound registered.

_No, oh god no._

Vyvyan threw himself over Rick as it hit and the house more than shook - it shattered. The floor fell away beneath them in pieces, and the ceiling followed close behind. Vyvyan felt something extremely heavy land on his back, and he blacked out, still shielding Rick from the worst of it. Just before all consciousness faded, he very clearly felt something much deeper and more pervasive than his own spine snap cleanly, but violently, in two.

****

When Vyvyan came to, it appeared to be morning. Thin fingers of light shone through the rubble above his head. He could move his head, that was something. He thought he could still feel his limbs, that was another. Whatever he'd felt break, it wasn't himself at least. Rick lay beneath him, barely conscious, breathing lightly, but alive. Blessedly alive. Vyvyan attempted to shift and found the final pile of rubble on his back wasn't too heavy - he was able to shrug it off and stand with only some difficulty. The scene he rose to drained what little color had returned to his face.

Half of it was gone. Half the house was simply gone, nothing but cracked stone and pulverized plaster and shattered wood. That was where Vyvyan stood, amid the ruin. The front of the house still stood, shaky and hollow, but there. The front wall looked as though the rest had simply been scooped away like a slice of jelly, nearly pristine aside from the broken windows. But it was only the front door. A bit of the sitting room. The stairs up to the landing. There was nothing else left. From where he stood, Vyvyan could see the street beyond, and it looked as pristine as the front wall - the bomb must have landed somewhere beyond the garden.

Sure enough, though oddly enough the wooden fence still stood, lacking only a few boards, the buildings beyond it had vanished, a thick haze of smoke and plaster dust left behind, glowing yellow in the morning sun. The shelter stood in the garden, strong, untouched. Vyvyan nearly felt it mocking him.

_How did you know? God, I hate you. I'm beginning to understand why._

Vyvyan knelt to check on Rick, who moaned softly. His morphine would be wearing off, if it hadn't already. Vyvyan looked around and was relieved to find his bag sitting just beyond Rick's head, thankfully unmarred other than a scratch or two. He picked it up before lifting Rick gently and carrying them both to the shelter. He'd need to get Rick settled, then start trying to find Neil and Mike in the rubble.

_If only to look for their bodies._

He set that thought aside and tended to Rick. When Vyvyan had landed on him, he'd pushed the shard in his side deeper in. The glass might have really hit something now, Rick's stomach or a bit of his intestine. He needed antiseptic, surgical sutures, sterile gauze. _God, it would be easier if-_

"Oh, wow," Neil's voice drifted into the shelter, "This is actually, really, literally unbelievably heavy."

He sounded fine. Vyvyan headed outside, found a bit of rubble with hippie hair sticking out of it, and pulled it away. Neil popped up from the small pocket underneath, generally unharmed aside from some bruises and scrapes. This was all very convenient, their all surviving safe and sound (well, possibly not sound in Rick's case, but still).

_At least I think I can be sure Mike's fine, anyway. He's probably just stuck under something and too proud to yell for help._

Vyvyan helped Neil up and scanned the rubble. "Rick's in the shelter," he told Neil without looking at him, "Go see what you can do with what's left in my bag." He heard Neil walk away, as he began searching for Mike. It had been the middle of the night, Mike would have been asleep - perhaps the attic roof saved him?

But there was no attic roof anymore - it was as flattened as anything else, the shingles scattered to the winds. Vyvyan headed in the general direction of where the attic would have fallen, a tall pile of stone and wooden beams, and just as he approached, he saw a hand sticking out from underneath a stone. Vyvyan grinned.

"Michael, if you're alive I'd be grateful to know it," he said as he began pulling debris away. There was no answer.

Vyvyan dug faster, tossing bits of rubble behind him, until finally he unearthed Mike - and fell to his knees.

Mike lay impaled on a jagged wooden spike, about half the width of his chest. His eyes were wide and unseeing, his face twisted into shock and fear. He hadn't died cleanly or quickly, but he was dead now.

Mike was dead.

Vyvyan stared at his body, too deep in shock to feel much of anything. He sat there on his knees, numb and barely there, until Neil's voice roused him from his stupor. He dimly heard Neil's concerned, panicked shout. He watched himself help Neil free the body from the wreckage, heard himself bark instructions.

He watched, distantly, as they lay Mike's body on the garden lawn and stepped back.

"I suppose we'd better get help," Neil said, and Vyvyan grunted an affirmative.

"I'll go," he said, "You stay with Rick."

"But don't you-"

But Vyvyan was already headed toward the garden gate. Neil shrugged and headed toward the shelter. He'd only just finished prepping Rick for glass removal when Vyvyan came in, looking somehow more spooked than ever.

"We have a problem," he said, and dragged Neil out to the garden.

He marched Neil over to the garden gate and threw it open. The haze still hung thick in the air, and he couldn't even see the alleyway behind it. Vyvyan shoved Neil through the gate, and in an instant, he found himself standing opposite it - in the doorway of what remained of the front door. He blinked in surprise, and turned around to find Vyvyan behind him, standing in…the street? No, it was as if the street were superimposed on the background, like a backdrop. Behind it was more of the same smoky haze that hung beyond the garden gate. The haze which, while it stretched up and filled the sky quite completely, seemed to almost… _stop_ at the garden gate. At the fence that most certainly should have been destroyed along with the house beyond it. Concern and understanding dawned, and he immediately pushed past Vyvyan, out into the street-haze - and wound up back in the garden again, facing the house.

"Oh no," he said.

"Heavy," said Vyvyan.

"We're trapped? But how…?"

"I haven't the slightest idea, Neil. But that appears to be the reality. I tried climbing over the fence, over the rubble, it’s no good. We're trapped like rats, not so much on a sinking ship as wreckage at the bottom of the fucking ocean, Rick's got one eye and a belly full of glass, the house is gone and Mike's-" he cut himself off, the name sending a spike of wild despair through the numb fog he waded through. He couldn't finish the sentence, not without going mad or bursting into tears, and he had neither time nor opportunity for either. Neil looked at him with such pity that he had to look away, and he resisted picking up a nearby stone and clobbering him with it. As satisfying as that would be, he needed his help to keep things as together as possible.

"…Mike's dead," Neil said kindly, and Vyvyan nodded without looking up. He picked up the stone he'd been eyeing and hurled it at the house's wreckage, sending a cascade of rubble down the pile. He paused a minute to let the numbness return to full strength, then he went looking for a shovel.

With Neil's help, from a far, far distance, Vyvyan watched himself dig a grave in the garden for the closest thing to a real father he had ever had.


	2. Torn

**Day 1**

Vyvyan sat at Mike's graveside, Neil standing above it, both of them dirty and tired.

"Should we say something?" Neil glanced at Vyvyan, who was seething at the dirt, staring at it with hollow fury. He was nearly shut down, but the bits of him that were still working seemed to be angrier than usual.

"If you like," he growled, "All I can say is he didn't deserve to go like this." He stood and stormed toward the shelter. Neil stayed to pay his respects a while longer. He cleared his throat and spoke to no one in particular.

“Mike was…well, Mike was Mike. He took care of us, and he taught us things, and he made sure we were all well paid. He was a good boss, and a good friend. He was kinder than he let on, and I think he loved each of us, in his way. I know we all loved him. …  Umm, ashes to ashes, dust to dust, what God has joined together, let…no, that’s not right.”

He knelt and sank his palm into the freshly laid dirt, trying to send a positive vibe to Mike’s soul. He closed his eyes.

“I’m sorry, Mike. Vyvyan’s right, you didn’t deserve this, and I’m sorry you’re dead. I hope your afterlife is filled with beautiful chicks who really dig you, and business ventures that always turn a profit.”

He sat cross-legged where he’d been kneeling. _My mind’s a complete jumble, I should meditate_. He placed his hands on his knees, palms up, and took several deep breaths. He let his thoughts move through him.

This was a bewildering day to say the least. From what he could tell, they’d been at home asleep, and then they’d been in the Blitz, and then they’d been nowhere at all, and that’s where they were now, along with what was left of the house and the garden. That was a rather terrifying concept, not actually knowing where you are. _I think I miss depression - I don’t think I’d mind as much if I didn’t care whether I lived or died._ But now he had reasons to live. Many, many reasons, at both of his homes. His thoughts immediately turned to his life-partners, and his daughter. What did Meadowlark and Summer experience last night? Were they all right? Did they know he was gone? Did Winnie?

_It’s her birthday soon. Goddess help me, it’s her birthday soon and I have no idea how to get to her. My baby girl is turning four years old in as many days, and I’m not going to be there. And Meadowlark's going to need my help soon. Goddess, what if I miss it?_

He began to cry, hovering just at the edges of the depth of his loss. He couldn’t abandon his family. But he couldn’t abandon Rick and Vyvyan either - they were his family too, after all. Rick needed real help, and they had incredibly limited resources. Vyvyan needed him. They would have to work together to find a way out of this, and they would have to do it quickly.

He stood. He dried his eyes and set his jaw, resolute. He’d find a way out of this. Come hell or high water, he’d find a way back to his girls, and if he had any say in the matter, he was taking Rick and Vyvyan with him. He headed into the shelter to help stabilize Rick, and see about finding a way to make supper.

_****_

_In the dream, he wasn’t there. He was there, standing right in front of the fireplace, he could see Mike on the phone, smell the dirty dishes, but he wasn’t there. It was almost like watching telly, but it felt very, very real. Realer than a dream._

_Mike hung up the phone, turned around and sighed deeply. He looked shaken. He walked slowly into the kitchen, as if he wasn’t quite sure where he was intending to go, and sat in a different chair than he normally did. Rick bounded downstairs and flounced into the kitchen._

_“Hi Mike! I heard the phone ring, was it them? They should have been back hours ago, it’s especially inconsiderate of them to only phone now. Was I right? Did Neil make them late? I think I’m right, you’re going to owe me, Mike-”_

_“Rick!” Mike’s shout startled Rick into silence, “You’re going to want to sit down.”_

_Rick sat down. Mike sighed again._

_“That…was the pigs. They found my business card in his wallet, he’d written ‘in case of emergency’  on the back, good lad.” He stopped himself, apparently overcome for a moment. Rick stared at him in confusion._

_“What? You aren’t making any sense, Mike, what’s going on?”_

_“They’re…It was on the M1. Some drunk in a van jumped the median…smacked right into them. Head-on collision. The car’s totaled, but they described it to me, it’s definitely his car. I’ve got to phone the boss, and then we’ve got to head up there…identify the bodies. …What’s left of them.”_

_Rick was shaking now, but he seemed not to want to grasp what he was hearing, “Mike, what are you telling me?”_

_Mike put a hand on Rick's arm, and Rick lost it before he could even speak. Simply that gesture coming from Mike meant the worst had happened, and there was no denying it. Mike spoke through Rick’s increasing hysteria._

_“Christ, Rick, I hate to say it, but he’s gone. Both of them, just like that, they’re both gone.”_

*****

**Day 5**

Rick lay propped up in bed, bandaged, healing, and bored out of his skull. He was feeling rather better, if extremely sore and tired, and he wanted to move about, take a walk or something, but Vyvyan wasn’t having it. He’d insisted on bed-rest for the foreseeable future, due to the wound in his side. Even with the glass removed and the site bandaged, he couldn’t be sure it hadn’t nicked something that could start bleeding uncontrollably; and without any sutures there was no way to fix any damage, anyway. So Rick was to stay as still as possible for as long as possible, to give himself a chance to heal on his own, and allow Vyvyan to keep an eye on him in case he _was_ bleeding internally. He even had to be helped to the loo (if that’s what you could call what they had available) humiliating as that was.

But Vyvyan wasn’t keeping an eye on him. Vyvyan was busying himself trying to find a way out of the garden. Neil was helping him. And Rick was close to going entirely stir crazy. He’d already made up several poems (which he couldn’t remember, because he had nothing to write them down on, or with), sung the entirety of the albums _The Queen is Dead_ and _Meat is Murder_ in his head (twice each…every day), and resorted to doing his multiplication tables, with little success. Maths had never been his strong suit.

The shelter door opened and he immediately started in, even before seeing which of the other two it was.

“Oh thank Moz, you’ve been outside for ages! I’ve been climbing up the ruddy walls in here! Oh, is it dark out there? Is it nighttime, or is it just dark? Do we still have weather? I’d meant to ask this morning only you were both gone as soon as you woke up, what are you _doing_ out there all day? I know, I know you’re trying to find a way out, but-”

He was cut off by something whizzing very close to his head and hitting the wall next to him. He picked it up - it was a book.

“Yes it’s dark, it’s nighttime, it seems as though we do, and I’ve been looking through the rubble for anything that might have survived the blast. Like that book. So read it and shut up.”

Rick looked at the book again. It was a Douglas Adams book he’d seen Vyvyan read half a million times, but hadn’t cracked himself. He generally preferred poetry to prose, but anything was better than staring at the blank plaster until he fell asleep again. Neil came in after Vyvyan and began hunting down yet more beans and tomatoes (they were beginning to miss lentils, frankly) for supper, pulling out the camping stove he’d been using sparingly. Rick opened the book with mild interest.

He was giggling wildly by page four.

By page eighteen, he was occasionally gaffawing.

By page fourty, he was laughing through the gag Vyvyan fitted him.

After dinner, Vyvyan lay down to read the book with him, reasoning that if he was going to keep laughing like an idiot, he might as well find out which parts Rick found the funniest.

*****

Rick and Vyvyan lay half awake in their bunk, Neil fast asleep across from them in his. They couldn’t see him, but they could hear his slow, even breaths. Vyvyan had his head gently laid on Rick’s chest, careful not to disturb his side at all. Rick stared into the darkness, half terrified. The pressure of Vyvyan’s head on his chest, Vyvyan’s hand gently tracing his arm, were the only things preventing sheer terror.

“Vyvyan?”

“Yeah?”

“We’re going to find a way out, aren’t we?”

“…Honestly, I’m not sure. But I think we are. There has to be a way. I’m not going to stop searching until I’m satisfied there’s nothing I can do. And I’m rarely satisfied of that, about anything.”

Rick lay quiet for a few minutes.

“Vyvyan?”

“Yeah?”

“…I really have lost an eye, haven’t I?”

“…Yes, I’m afraid so, poof. I’m sorry, honestly, I’d have saved it if I could.”

“I know,” he sighed, then chuckled a bit, “Would you still love me if I were horribly disfigured?”

Vyvyan chuckled as well, “I suppose we’ll have to test that one out. Though I think I can say my original answer still stands. Even if we won’t be able to use your equipment for a while.”

Rick outright laughed at that, and Neil made an indignant, sleepy whine. The two laughed together at the sound, quietly. Vyvyan sat up a bit and kissed Rick on the temple, “Get some rest, poof.”

He rolled over, but Rick grabbed his hand as he did. They laced fingers and Vyvyan squeezed tight. Rick squeezed back.

“Goodnight Vyvyan. …I love you.”

“G’night poof. Love you.” 

_More than I could ever adequately express. I'm going to get you out of here. I swear._

*****

_In the dream, he was at Murphy’s Pub, and attending some sort of party. Everyone was in black, and the mood seemed a bit muddled, all joy and sadness at once. No, this wasn’t a party. It was a wake. It was his wake. And it was becoming clearer by the moment that these weren’t dreams. Or rather, they were dreams, but of decidedly real events. He was most definitely dead._

_Only he wasn’t dead. Vyvyan was dead, that much was clear: there was a memorial picture of him on the bar, right next to Neil’s picture. But he wasn’t dead. The dead man was some other Vyvyan, one who was him, but not him. _

_There were a great number of people there - his friends, Neil’s friends, business associates - he had no idea so many people would care if he died. He noticed the obvious absence of his mother and felt more relief than anything - he’d hate to have cut someone out of his life who loved him, even if she was awful. But there was something freeing about knowing she couldn’t be bothered to attend._

_He noticed Rick hadn’t shown up either, but he doubted it was a sign he didn’t care; just the opposite. Knowing him as he did, Rick was probably at home, too devastated to pretend to socialize. He thought to head home to find him, when he noticed Neil’s family._

_Summer and Meadowlark stood near the bar, Summer holding little Éowyn, Meadowlark visibly pregnant. Neil hadn’t told them about Meadowlark; or perhaps he had, and none of them had paid attention. Summer seemed to be keeping it together rather well, possibly for her daughter’s sake, but Meadowlark was visibly upset. She was clearly trying not to make a scene, but she sobbed quietly into a handkerchief. Éowyn reached for her._

_“Don’t cry, mumma,” she said, patting her mother’s shoulder, “Daddy’s gone away, but he’ll be back soon.”_

_“Oh darling,” Meadowlark said, caressing the fine blond hair she’d inherited from Summer, “That’s what we’ve been trying to explain to you.”_

_“Dead means you don’t come back, Winnie my love,” Summer said gently, “I’m afraid daddy has gone away forever.” Speaking this truth finally broke Summer’s strong facade, and she broke into tears, leaning into Meadowlark with their daughter between them in a family hug._

_Éowyn shook her head at Summer, “No mummy, he’s going to come back!” The girl seemed strangely frustrated, as though she were trying to explain something patently obvious to her rather dim parents. She struggled to be let go, and Summer set her down, moving deeper into her partner’s arms._

_The little girl ran about around her mothers’ feet for a few moments, before breaking off and darting between other attendee’s legs. She eventually made her way over to him, and he was startled to realize she was looking at him. She saw him, though no one else in the room seemed to. She stopped at his feet and smiled up at him. He looked down at her, perplexed. He suddenly considered how little experience he had interacting with small children, and a little flicker of panic zipped through him. He had no idea what he was doing._

_“Hello,” she said, “My name’s Éowyn.”_

_“Hi,” he said, unusually nervous, “I’m Vyvyan.”_

_She smiled wider, “I like your name, it’s pretty. Daddy talks about you sometimes, he says you’re a little scary, but nice on the inside.” She studied him, “You don’t look scary to me. I think you look nice on the outside. I like your stars. You look like you like to play a lot. Do you like to play a lot?”_

_He felt a bit overwhelmed at this rush of information. He considered her question, “…Yes, I suppose so. I like to make my own fun, and I like games and jokes and…I like to play grown-up games as well.”_

_She nodded as if this was a matter of course, “Your picture is next to daddy’s, have you died as well?”_

_He nodded, “It appears so.”_

_She leaned in as if to tell him a secret, and he bent down to hear it._

_“Don’t worry,” she said, in a conspiratorial whisper, “If you and daddy follow the threads, you’ll come back!”_

_Vyvyan knelt to her level and searched her face, the dark, deep eyes so like her father’s, “What was that?”_

_She smiled a conspiratorial smile at him, then giggled._

_“Bye-bye!” She waved and ran away, and as the dream melted around him,_ he woke feeling more than a little bewildered.

*****

**Day 7**

“Ooohh, why is it so cold this morning?” Rick said, hugging himself, “My teeth are practically chattering!”

Vyvyan stopped at the door and looked back at him, “It isn’t cold. It’s actually rather warm in here.”

He crossed back over to Rick and felt his forehead. He frowned.

“Lean forward a bit. Slowly.”

Rick did so. Vyvyan felt his back. He frowned deeper. He checked Rick’s pulse and muttered, “Fuck.”

“What?” Rick said, panicked, “What is it?”

_It isn’t sepsis. It doesn’t have to be sepsis. He could have picked up a bug, he might be fine tomorrow._

_But it might be sepsis. I didn’t even have a chance to clean it properly, I didn't have anything to clean it with. And there could still be window glass in there, somewhere, all sort of little nasties hanging about. Fuck, it really might be sepsis._

“Lie down, I need to look at your side.”

Rick obliged, watching Vyvyan with worry. Vyvyan pulled his (unfortunately, less than fresh) bandage away from his side and took a look at the wound.

It was healing all right, it wasn’t bleeding like it had been, and the scab had finally stopped weeping. But now it was looking swollen and red at the edges - it hadn’t when this bandage went on.

_Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck._

“I want you to stay in bed again today.”

Rick whined, and Vyvyan pointed a threatening finger at him.

“No, you are not going to fight me on this. Your side’s infected, and you’ve got a bloody fever, and you’re not going anywhere. You’re staying in bed, and I’m going out to find antibiotics.”

“You’re not serious.”

“I’m dead serious. There’s a perfectly good bottle of antibiotics out there somewhere, there’s more than one I think, and I’m going to find it. Read your book. Write poetry in the margins with that biro I found yesterday. I’ll send Neil in to keep you company. I won’t be long, I’m sure I can find some.”

_I’ve got to. I’ve got to find some. I don’t want to think about what will happen if I don’t, so it isn’t an option. I’ll find some, that’s the end of it._

"But I feel fine! I'm just a bit cold, that's all!" Rick protested. Vyvyan ignored him. He poured Rick some water and left the jug next to the bed.

“Drink lots of water, _don’t_ bundle up too much no matter how cold you think you feel, and Stay. In. Bed.”

He kissed Rick’s forehead, “I’ll be right back, I promise. It’s not a problem.”

Rick groaned, “Ugh, all _right_. You’d better be, I feel like you’re spending all your time out there.”

“I can’t find a way out from in here, poof. Now shut up and read your book, I’ve got to go find you some meds.”

Vyvyan took one last look at him before he left the shelter. Rick couldn’t help but notice that the look didn’t seem like an, “everything’s fine” look. It was more of a, “God, don’t let this be the last time I see him,” look, and that was more than a little worrisome. But he trusted Vyvyan, if he said he could help, he probably could. So he sipped his water and read. After Neil came in, they chatted about the book and Neil’s progress in trying to find a gap in the barrier.

By the end of the day, he was feeling a bit addled and not quite able to focus on reading. He fell asleep before supper. Vyvyan didn’t come back inside all day, not even for supper.


	3. Tatters

_In the dream, he was in a graveyard. He was standing in front of an elaborate headstone, nearly as tall as him - the ultra-custom sort that cost an insulting amount of money. It was unfinished black granite, an octagonal pedestal with a Rod of Asclepius etched into each face. Atop the pedestal, a demonic-looking gargoyle stood snarling, reaching out one gnarled claw over an etched plaque. It read:_

_Vyvyan Basterd_  
_"The Mad Doc"_  
_1963-1994_  
_Exercised the Beast Within_  
_Loved, and Was Loved, Fiercely_  
_Died Before His Time_

_He was rather embarrassed by the girly, love-y part (he was sure Rick had insisted on that), but the rest was impressive. But then he felt immensely embarrassed at how much this monstrosity must have cost. He was both touched and horrified that anyone would spend that sort of money just to mark his corpse. He heard footfalls in the grass behind him and turned to see Rory approaching, carrying a bottle of whiskey._

_"Alright Vyv," he said, and for half a second he thought Rory could see him, but then he spoke directly through him, to the gravestone, "Sorry I weren't here all last week, only Mike's got me workin' overtime. You know how it is when we're short-handed. But I brought you this," he held up the bottle and shook it a little, "London Molotov, just the way you like it."_

_He knelt at the grave, unscrewed the bottle, and poured half the contents into the dirt, slowly and with great care. He was standing right in front of Rory, and Rory's arm moved right through his legs; it didn't feel like anything at all. But as the liquid soaked into the still-fresh soil, he swore he could suddenly taste it. Whiskey, lighter fluid and hot curry powder, with a hint of Babycham. He breathed a surprised laugh, and then smiled to himself. He shouldn't be surprised; it was his grave after all. Well, one of his graves, anyway._

_"You like that whiskey? You should, it's from The Wolf's private stock. Mike said he don't even think he's ever had any."_

_Vyvyan smiled at Rory, "I do, actually. It's great. Thanks, arseface." He knew Rory couldn't hear him, but it felt nice to talk to him anyway. He missed Rory._

_Rory sat down and swigged from the bottle. He watched the grave for a long moment, blinking back tears that he managed to keep from falling and sniffling a bit._

_"I miss you, Vyv. All of us, we miss you a lot. The gang hasn't got together since the wake, and I dunno what we're gonna do without you, anyway. And the lads 'round the Business..."_

_Rory paused, and Vyvyan frowned and tested the headstone - it seemed solid enough (oddly), so he hopped up onto the ledge next to the gargoyle and sat down. He watched Rory carefully._

_"Mike ain't the same man, Vyv. It's like somebody's knocked the wind out of him. He goes through the motions, sure, and he's as sharp as ever, but…his heart just ain't in it, you know? He's lost all his swagger."_

_Rory poured him another drink and sighed. He stared at the bottle, then chugged a bit of it. He wiped his mouth and belched._

_"Heh, that one weren't bad!"_

_They giggled together for a few seconds, then Rory turned somber again. He sighed._

_"Vyv, I don't want you thinkin'  Rick's been fuckin' about instead of comin' to see you. It ain't like that at all. He don't go nowhere, is all. He don't even leave his room, most days. If I'm around I try to at least get him to eat somethin', else he might not all day. Everybody's gettin' a little worried."_

_That wasn't good. No, no, that wouldn't do at all. He needed to find Rick and make sure he was all right, at least try. He hopped off of the gravestone and nodded at Rory, "Thanks, arseface. Really. For everything."_

_He turned away from Rory, intending to somehow make it home. He was dreaming after all, or possibly a ghost, or both, so he should just be able to twist reality to his whim and simply arrive there, shouldn't he? He concentrated, and for a moment he thought he could see the house, but then the picture blurred, and the world around him went white. For just a moment he thought he heard Rick's voice, and he ached to move toward it, but he couldn't locate it, and the strain of trying was waking him up. _

_Where are you? How do I find you?_

*****

**Day 9**

Vyvyan woke with a start, and it took a moment to realize where he was. He looked around and it all came back immediately. He was on the mattress he'd retrieved and set aside, out in the garden. It was dawn, and time to keep searching.

Dawn was a bit of an overstatement, actually. It was light. There had been definite sunrises and sunsets the first few days, but lately things were getting a bit less…defined. The blurred edges of the haze that surrounded them seemed a bit _more_ blurred. The garden somehow felt claustrophobic, as though the sky was closing in. Vyvyan wasn't certain, but he was beginning to suspect the little pocket of…whatever…they were in might be collapsing. Collapsing slowly, they might have several days, even weeks left, but collapsing nonetheless. As if he didn't feel enough urgency already.

He not only hadn't found any antibiotics yet, he hadn't found _any_ meds. He knew he had an entire cupboard full in the lab, so where was the cupboard? Had it been smashed to bits in the bombing, and if so, where were its contents? Surely _something_ would have survived. He'd already found his boots (or possibly Rick's - either way it was a blessing, because the soles of his feet weren't doing much better than Rick's arm - not yet infected, but not healing as quickly as expected) and their mattress, and various other items from their room, but they were scattered to the winds, nowhere near each other.

He'd moved on to a methodical search now, patiently (if somewhat frantically) sorting through the wreckage, creating piles of sorted stone and wood and salvage. Order from chaos. He just had to keep looking.

_I won't stop until I've found it. I won't lose him, I can't._

_Just hold on poof, I'll fix everything, I promise._

_I promise._

*****

Inside the bunker, Neil fought what increasingly felt like a losing battle with Rick's fever. Yesterday morning it seemed like he was heading toward recovery, but then he'd gone incoherent, and he hadn't snapped out of it since. He was currently hovering at the edge of consciousness, rambling whispered nonsense and occasionally whimpering in pain. He'd been complaining of a bellyache just before he'd worsened, and it seemed it was still around.

Neil had very little to work with - some room-temperature water, drinking water, he was using to keep cloths wet and cooler than Rick's sweltering skin. He'd also gone ahead and doused the sheet, hoping it would act as a sweat replacement and help keep him cooler. He sat on the only stool in the bunker, trying to at least keep Rick stabilized. But he wasn't stabilizing; he was spiraling.

"Here's some more water, Rick," he propped Rick up a bit and held the glass to his mouth. Rick's eye fluttered open. He frowned at Neil.

"Hatch the guard," he said, "There isn't any."

Neil sighed and tried again, "You need to drink it, Rick."

Rick sat up on his own. He took the water glass from Neil and drank. "It's shrinking," he said, looking directly at Neil and suddenly seeming much more lucid, "There isn't time."

He took another sip of water and closed his eye. When he opened it again, it shone with fever.

"How did they know?" he said, laying down again and sinking closer to unconsciousness, "Vyvyan…"

He slipped back into the half-sleep he'd been in and out of for hours, muttering Vyvyan's name amid more nonsense. Except…was that bit in the middle nonsense? Neil had also noticed the change in the environment outside, felt the edges of the world closing in.

_Odin gave an eye in exchange for cosmic wisdom. What if the same thing's happened to Rick?_

Neil cast a resentful glance toward the shelter door. He should be out there, trying to find a way out of the garden. It should be Vyvyan in here. It was Vyvyan Rick was calling for, and it was Vyvyan who would know better what to do. _I know he thinks he_ _'s doing what's best. Or at least that's what he's telling himself._ Neil had a different perspective. He could see the panic on Vyvyan's face as he tore through the wreckage, hear the quaver in his voice when he barked orders at Neil to stay inside; he was trying to avoid the inevitable.

_He's never lost a patient, he doesn't want Rick to be his first. He'd rather be out there searching for a potential cure than in here, watching him die._

Neil grunted. He didn't blame him; he didn't want to watch Rick die either. But never mind that, Rick _needed_ Vyvyan now. And whether Vyvyan wanted to face it or not, he needed Rick as well.

_I hope he figures that out before it's too late._

*****

_In the dream, everything was a jumble. Images and sounds flew through his head, with little rhyme or reason. But eventually his mind began to make sense out of senselessness._

_He saw the house, as if he were standing out front on the street. It glowed like a beacon, pulsing with an energy that was at once terrifying and comforting. Its glow spread out to the city beyond it, the country, the world. The glow fed everything it touched, like roots. _

_He saw the four of them, glowing with the same energy, moving in and out of the house like a dance. Every time all four were inside, the house's glow grew brighter, seemed stronger and somehow protective. As though they were both feeding the house and being fed by it; a symbiotic relationship._

_He saw a little dollhouse, shaped just like their house, in a little model London. He watched as the house was suddenly pulled away from the model by an invisible force, hovering over it. The model collapsed in on itself, folding and folding until it was a black hole, the house orbiting the edge. With every rotation, little bits were pulled off the house and toward the center. The house glowed faintly, weakly, a fire in a gale._

_He saw more, an infinity of more, so much that he couldn't stand it. He tore_ himself awake, but the fever grabbed hold and _it was as if he'd never woken up at all. He grabbed Neil's arm, startling him, and babbled at him, trying to remember anything of what he'd just seen. He had to tell him, he had to get them out, save them._

_"Get to another house," he heard himself say, "It'll never hold, just leave me here and follow the threads." He wasn't even sure what it meant, entirely, he only knew he had to say it._

_Neil watched him with pity. He patted Rick's hand, like one would a child, or a madman. Rick took his hand away and turned away from Neil, frustrated._

_Within minutes he didn't even remember where he was, let alone his frustration with Neil, or the rush of maddening visions._

*****

**Day 12**

Vyvyan dug through the wreckage, exhausted, hungry, and desperate. Every cell screamed with pain or panic or both. It was getting harder to lie to himself about what he was doing out here, and he was losing hope of ever finding what he was searching for. But he couldn't stop, he couldn't let himself. A part of him was beginning to shout at him, imploring him to go to Rick's side and comfort him, be with him. But a louder part, the part of him that clung to pride and honor as much as it did to anger and violence (and though he would never admit to it, fear), demanded that he keep looking.

_To give up is to lose. I will not lose._

He heard the shelter door open and he froze for a moment. He told Neil to only interrupt him in an emergency.

_Fuck, no no no_ _…_

"What?" he demanded, "What's the matter?"

"You know damn well what the matter is, man," Neil said, and he was livid. Vyvyan felt similarly; he didn't have time for guessing games.

"…Is he…"

"No. Not yet. But he will be, and soon. He's started to cry, I think he's in pain, but I'm afraid to give him anything for it because he's so close to the edge already. We're losing him, Vyv. I get that admitting to it is a heavy prospect, but you've got to face facts. Even if you found them, what good would a single bottle of penicillin do now? It's tossing a sponge into the sea. It's too late."

"No, I know I can-"

"No you don't, Vyv, you know better than that! Look, you've got two options, you either get in there and say your goodbyes properly while there's still time, or you keep dithering out here until I come to tell you he's died without you. Which would you rather?"

That made him angrier than ever before, and had Neil not been Rick's caretaker he might have actually tried to seriously hurt him. Instead, Vyvyan balled his fists until his nails struck blood on his palms.

"I'm going to save him. Get back in there and take care of him until I do."

Neil stared at him for a long while, angry and a bit disgusted. Then he shook his head and turned back.

"Stubborn bastard," he threw behind him as he went.

Vyvyan didn't even watch him go - he had meds to find.

*****

He nearly cried when he unearthed the cupboard, wedged between a huge swath of plaster and several large stones. Instead he grinned wide and pulled it from the wreckage. He turned it over - it was somewhat in one piece, though the glass in the doors was shattered, along with…

_No. No, no, no, no, no…_

They were glass. He hadn't even considered it, they were relatively sturdy, but the all bottles in his lab were glass. A few useless ones survived, but the majority had spilled their contents to the wind - or to the pile of miscellaneous, half-dissolved, half-melted medication lying in the damp ground where the cupboard had fallen, steeped in a fortnight of dirt and decay. Vyvyan's chest felt at once hollow and full to bursting. The denials screaming in his head tore through his mouth as he stared at the amalgamation of a myriad different pills, doused in a dozen liquid medicines, indistinguishable, useless. He stomped at the worthless, chalky mess, wailing in rage and agony.

"No, No, No, No, NO, NO, NO, FUCK, FUCK, FUCK! AUUUUUUUGGGGHHHHHH!"

He screamed his throat raw. He threw anything he could reach, screaming to the heavens, to any passing god who could hear him.

"WHY? WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS, YOU FUCKING SADISTIC BASTARD? ARE YOU UP THERE HAVING A FUCKING LAUGH, IS THAT IT? FUCK YOU! FUCK YOU, YOU HEARTLESS CUNT, YOU CAN'T TAKE HIM AWAY FROM ME!"

He dropped to the ground where he stood, propping himself up with his raw, aching hands. Spent. Resigned.

"You can't," he said anyway, with no hint of fury left, only pain and sorrow, "I won't let you."

He thought he might cry, but he simply couldn't. He was sunk into a place beyond tears.

He stared, listless, at the grave of his last hope for a few more minutes before he made himself get up and head toward the shelter.

*****

Vyvyan opened the shelter door, ashamed and sheepish. Neil stood immediately and approached him. He nodded at Vyvyan, who looked past him and at Rick. His one good eye was closed, his breathing was ragged and strained, and he occasionally grimaced in pain, but he was still alive.

Neil clapped him on the shoulder and headed past him, toward the door. Vyvyan's eyes stayed on Rick, but he called behind him, "I'll let you know if there's any change."

Neil nearly thanked him, but they both knew what the change would be, and it didn't feel right somehow.

Vyvyan heard the door close, and it was just the two of them, in a little concrete box lit by bluish fluorescent light, at the end of the world. Vyvyan sat on the stool and looked Rick over. It was worse than he'd feared. He was clearly jaundiced, and his left hand was severely edemic, swollen to twice its size; his fingers were turning black, along with the flesh around each of the wounds on his arm.

_God, I'm so sorry. I'm sorry I couldn't protect you. I tried, I really did. But I suppose that doesn't matter in the end._

He reached for his bag, sitting between the bunks, and pulled out the hypo and the morphine.

_I can at least do this, poof. I'm sorry I failed at everything._

He drew a small amount, careful not to overdo it - Neil was right to be hesitant, Rick was in such a fragile state, an extra milliliter could push him over the edge. He administered the shot, set the equipment aside and crawled into bed with Rick, gathering him into his arms.

Rick stirred, waking from his half-sleep. He looked at Vyvyan in a surprisingly lucid state.

"You're back."

His voice was barely there, it clearly took effort to speak. Vyvyan stroked his cheek and shushed him.

"Yes, and I'm sorry it took so long."

Rick groaned, "It hurts so much."

"I know, I'm sorry."

"Make it stop, Vyv. Please make it stop."

"I wish I could."

"…You could."

"No, I can't. If I give you any more painkiller you might die."

"I'm dying already, make it stop hurting."

"…I can't." Vyvyan's voice was small and hesitant. He knew what Rick was really asking him, and he was immediately stuck in a battle between emotion and logic, both of them arguing both sides.

_I couldn't possibly…But he's hurting so much, and he's begging you to do it, can you be so cruel as to ignore that? But he doesn't know what he's saying, he's been delirious for days. But does that even matter? Would you rather he die in horrible pain, or soothed and unconscious? That isn't the question, the question is, what would he rather? But he just told you. But can you trust his word? _

_And moreover, can you do this and still live with yourself?_

The conflict raged, freezing Vyvyan in place. Rick watched him with tears brimming.

"Please, Vyv. _Please just make it stop._ "

Vyvyan hesitated, then reached down and picked up the morphine and hypo once again. He drew just a bit more, and gave it to Rick. Rick visibly relaxed, but he stayed conscious, clearly determined to stay awake as long as possible. Vyvyan watched him, trying to reach inside himself for the immense love he had for him, but it was muffled with everything else, locked behind a haze of shock and grief. Still, he knew it was there somewhere, and he stroked Rick's cheek again and pulled his head to his chest.

"I'm here, poof. Don't be afraid. I'm right here."

He felt Rick smile against his chest. He was surprised to hear him sing, in a sort of whisper, weak as he was.

"… _To die by your side, well the pleasure and the privilege is mine_."

Of course. A Morrissey fan to the end. Though he had to admit, it was an apt song. It made him consider the ideas he held about death and reincarnation. Neil would have been shocked to discover that their views on the subject were actually quite similar, were Vyvyan to ever discuss such things with anyone.

" _There is a light, and it never goes out,_ " Vyvyan sang quietly, in the hope that maybe it was soothing. Rick sang it back. It became a bit of a mantra, the two of them whisper-singing the line, until Rick was cut off by a sharp intake of breath.

_Still in pain. Fuck, poof, you're really going to make me do it, aren't you?_

Vyvyan loaded the hypo - with all of the remaining morphine he could fit into it. He primed the shot, lifted Rick's arm and lined up the needle. He closed his eyes, trying and failing to take comfort in the idea of meeting Rick again in the next life. How long might that take? How would he even recognize him?

_It doesn't matter right now. You're being selfish, you can't let him suffer._

He took a deep breath and pushed the needle into Rick's arm. He pressed the plunger down, pulled the needle out and tossed it aside. He sang to him, as he brushed a soothing hand over Rick's head, Rick's back. Held him tight and rocked him gently.

_There is a light, and it never goes out._

_There is a light, and it never goes out._

 


	4. Patchwork

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a note, I know I put it in the tags, but please be aware that this chapter goes into some pretty gruesome shit, involving fire.

**Day 13**

Neil awoke on the mattress in the garden. He must have dozed off waiting for word from Vyvyan. He’d had another one of those dreams, the ones that felt more like visions. He didn’t know what any of it meant, but he was sure it meant something important. If only he could remember more when he woke up. All that stuck was that odd phrase Rick had said, ringing in his head over and over.

_Follow the threads._

It had something to do with his dream, but it was gone before he could even reach it. Ah well, he’d meditate on it later and try to remember, he could usually recover them that way, if he was patient enough.

He stood and brushed himself off, looking up at the looming sky. It was turning black. Had he been in a normal place, he would have said it looked like rain. But the haze above him wasn’t quite clouds, and the darkness within it was nothing like rain. Besides, the edges of the rest of the garden were turning similarly hazy and dark. The front of the house was gone, shrouded in nothingness. He looked toward the shelter, relatively safe beside the impossible fence, the garden gate still reachable. He didn’t even want to know what might happen if he tried to go through it now. Best to check in - though if Vyv wasn’t out here by now, he feared the worst.

He stooped to get through the low door, and looked back to Rick’s bunk. Vyvyan lay in it, holding Rick in his arms, cradling Rick’s head to his chest. Vyvyan wore a dazed, thousand-yard stare. Rick was very, very still.

Neil made his way to the back, and knelt by the bed. Vyvyan didn’t turn to look at him, didn’t even acknowledge his presence.

“Vyv?” he tried gently, “Is he…”

Vyvyan nodded slowly, distantly. He made no other moves, said nothing. Neil choked up for a moment, then swallowed it - Vyvyan wasn’t at all well, and it seemed Neil needed to be the strong one in this situation.

“I’m sorry, Vyv. I know it doesn’t really mean anything at a time like this, but I really am sorry.”

He wasn’t even sure Vyvyan was hearing him completely - he didn’t respond to that at all.

Neil stood and sighed a deep sigh. “I’ll be outside…bring him out when you’re ready. Take all the time you need.”

He was halfway to the door when Vyvyan spoke, his voice hollow and deadened. Neil wasn’t familiar with the tone, but Rick would have recognized it as the Eerie voice - a voice typically reserved for sleep-talking.

“…We have to burn him.”

Neil stopped, not entirely sure he’d heard him correctly. He turned around.

“He made me promise,” Vyvyan continued, the same blank stare, the same Eerie voice, “A long time ago. He can’t stand the idea of rotting in the ground, he doesn’t want to be a corpse. We have to burn him.”

Neil returned to Vyvyan’s side and knelt again, watching Vyvyan with concern.

“Are you sure?”

Vyvyan nodded, but didn’t turn toward him, didn’t look at him at all, “I promised.”

Neil nodded back, though he doubted Vyvyan even fully recognized he was there.

“…I suppose I’ll gather as much wood as I can.”

“…I’ll help. …Give me a minute.”

“…Vyv, you don’t need to…”

Vyvyan blinked, and finally looked at Neil. Seemed to really _acknowledge_ Neil for the first time since he’d entered the room.

“Yes I do,” he said, and in his eyes, where Neil expected to find pain or anger, there was simply a stare, as hollow as his voice.

There was nothing at all.

*****

They built the pyre atop the slab-roof of the shelter, from the pile of wood Vyvyan had gathered over his search. By the time they finished, Vyvyan was…well, better wasn’t quite the right word. He was faster, he seemed more engaged with his surroundings, but he spoke very little, only when he had to. And when he did, his voice held no emotion, and none of the exuberance or even the volume of his usual voice. He didn’t really seem to focus on anything, and he seemed completely unable to meet Neil’s eyes. He was simply…not quite there. Blank. Neil watched with concern as Vyvyan lay Rick on the pyre - he’d insisted on doing it himself. But even as he arranged him gently, his movements were stiff and distant. As though he were respectfully tending to the corpse of a stranger.

“Go on,” Vyvyan said, without looking at him, “I can finish it. I assume you don’t want to watch.”

“…I assumed neither of us did.”

“I have to. You don’t.”

Neil frowned uncomfortably. Had it been anyone else, he could have imagined Vyvyan eagerly anticipating the sight. But this wasn’t anyone else - this was Rick. And Vyvyan didn’t seem eager - far from it. He watched Vyvyan for a moment, then nodded. If it was what Vyvyan thought he had to do, he couldn’t very well argue. He approached the pyre and put a hand on Rick’s shoulder.

“Goodbye, Rick. I’m sorry I haven’t got a poem or anything, I only wanted to say…” he choked up, unable to prevent himself, “I’m glad we ended as friends.”

He pulled his hand away to cover his face as tears began to fall, and he fully expected Vyvyan to yell at or hit him. But he simply stood there - as if Neil weren’t even there, let alone blubbering. Neil wiped his tears away and took one more, concerned look at Vyvyan, searching his face for something - anything. But Vyvyan didn’t even look at him, didn’t even shift his hollow eyes away from a point somewhere beyond Rick.

_Is this who Vyvyan is now? Did the Vyvyan I know die last night?_

He didn’t have an answer. He only knew he didn’t want to be there for what came next. He went into the shelter and closed the door.

Vyvyan was no more emotive after Neil left. He continued his slow, deliberate ritual, breaking his lighter open and pouring the fluid on various rags, stuffing them into strategic holes, and finally lighting each in turn with the matches Neil had been using to light the camping stove. Then he sat on a heap of rubble in front of the pyre and watched.

He watched as the rags burned down to the wood, watched the wood catch. He watched embers begin to fly, and heat waves obscure Rick’s body. He watched flame begin to lick at the edges of him. He watched Rick’s hair and pajama bottoms catch fire.

He watched Rick catch fire.

The smell of burning flesh hit Vyvyan’s nostrils and before he even knew what was happening, he turned and vomited. He hadn’t eaten anything in days, and he only brought up bile, but he dry heaved nonetheless. He fought the nausea and forced his eyes back to the fire, to Rick. He refused to allow himself to look away.

_This is my penance. This is what I deserve. If I were any sort of man at all, I’d throw my worthless carcass on the fucking fire and give him some sort of justice, but I’m a fucking coward. I am a coward and a failure and I as good as murdered the one person I love above all others and this is my penance. I have been tested and found wanting. I brought this upon myself. It should have been me._

_It should be me._

*****

**Day 16**

The garden was nearly gone. All that was left was a bit of grass and rubble just around the shelter, and along the fence to the garden gate. Everything else was shrouded in a writhing, black mist, something somehow liquid and gaseous at once. If it continued shrinking at this rate, Neil estimated they had a day left, maybe two, before the darkness reached the door of the shelter and trapped them.

Neil paced the short length of the shelter, reading the list he’d made and occasionally scribbling notes on it. He muttered to himself, repeating things he’d been over for days, trying to make some sort of connection, find some sort of answer to the puzzle.

“So in the third dream, I was at home with the girls, except nobody could see me. I went into Winnie’s room and watched her sleep a bit, and then I saw the drawing on the wall. It looked like you and me surrounded by stars and flowers and grass and there was this black line through us. And when I woke up that was all I could remember, the picture, along with that phrase again - follow the threads. Follow the threads, get to another house, what does it _mean?_ ”

“What does it matter?” Vyvyan muttered, his voice creaking from disuse, “We’ll be dead in a day or so.”

Neil jumped. It was the first thing Vyvyan had said since he’d wandered back into the shelter and thrown himself onto his bunk, three days ago. He lay on his side, staring through the opposite bunk, through the wall, neither quite asleep or quite awake. He’d barely moved, Neil had to basically force him to eat and drink something yesterday before he dehydrated and died. And this was the first thing he chose to say?

That was it. That was the limit. Grief was grief and trauma was trauma, but Neil had finally reached his breaking point. He stormed over to Vyvyan’s side and shook him, somewhat violently.

“Damn you, Vyvyan, I know you’re in there somewhere, come back! I can’t figure this out on my own, and I _know_ you must know something! You’re not allowed to give up, not now, not when we could still get out! I know you don’t think there’s any point, but frankly I don’t care - my girls are out there somewhere, my _daughter_ , and I am not going to let you lie there feeling sorry for yourself when I know you could help me get to them!”

Vyvyan stared through him, seemingly unmoved. Neil sat back against the wall between the bunks, frustrated and closer to despair than ever. He put his face in his hands and sat there, paralyzed and helpless.

“…Follow the threads.”

Neil took his hands away and looked at Vyvyan, who hadn’t seemed to move, but he’d definitely spoken, if quietly and without feeling.

“…I don’t know what it means…but I’ve heard it as well…in the place where we’re dead…from your daughter.”

Neil sat up and leaned toward Vyvyan, ready to listen to whatever he had to say.

*****

_In the dream, Rick was burning. They stood in nothingness, blackness all around them, and the flames engulfing him gave off no light. He was half-gone already, his charred skin peeling away from his blackening bones. Two bright blue eyes stared into his soul, seemingly impervious to the flame._

_He wasn’t frightened – he’d watched his lifemate burn once already and while the sight was no more pleasant the second time, he felt no danger from the apparition. This didn’t feel at all like a nightmare, more like a vision; something vitally important. Rick opened what was left of his mouth and spoke, his voice a foreign, raspy whisper._

_“It is crumbling. There is no time,” he said, a strange, stilted way of speaking – as though something else spoke through him, “Follow the threads or all will be lost.”_

_“But I don’t understand! Everyone keeps saying it, but I don’t understand! What threads? How do I follow them?”_

_“Look, my love,” Rick reached out a melting hand and pushed it effortlessly into Vyvyan’s chest. Warmth spread through him and every cell in his body felt somehow more alive, more aware, “Close your eyes, and see.”_

_He closed his eyes. He saw._

_He felt himself begin to expand, separate, his entire being unwinding in an endless, perfect pattern. He saw the past and the future all at once, and it should have overwhelmed him, but it didn’t because he was the past and the future. He was woven into the fabric of the Universe. _

_And now he was fully aware of them – the others. The ones who were them, but not them. Vyvyan, Rick, Mike and Neil going to University in perpetuity, eternally youthful and unchanging. Vyvyan, Rick, Mike and Neil working The Business, making money hand over fist and earning a sizable retirement. Vyvyan, Rick, Mike and Neil going their separate ways after graduation. Vyvyan and Mike on the streets, working a scam. Neil and Rick tucked away in the cellar, chatting philosophy while they process their drugs. Vyvyan and Rick hopelessly in love, growing old together. Vyvyan and Rick hating each other, living as far away from each other as possible. A double-decker bus lying smashed at the bottom of a ravine, burning for all eternity._

_He saw all times converge at the moment they first met, first arrived at the house – the first house, the one destroyed by the plane. He watched time bottleneck at that point, squeezing into impossible contortions throughout their first year, up through their moving into the second house. Before that moment, the past was a single, steady progression for each of them – distinct, individual, constant. But once they moved to that second house, time splintered off in uncountable directions. Countless worlds, some nearly identical, some so wildly different that they were barely recognizable, flowed from the focal point like a spray of water. Some even stretched back in time as well as forward, rewriting their own histories. But no matter now alien the world, no matter how identical, each was traceable back to the four of them together in the house for the first time. And as the infinity of their existence became clearer, as he began to understand the immensity of it, that was when he finally saw the threads. _

_Translucent cords leading from each of their chests, moving into each other’s. The four sitting in front of the telly, threads languishing lazily between them. Rick and Vyvyan fighting, the thread stretched between them, glowing hot with anger and adrenaline. Rick and Vyvyan in an intimate embrace, a glorious thread wrapped around them in a brilliant white glow. Everyone home but apart, the threads stretched throughout the house, pulsing with steady energy. Infinite lives, infinite threads, always in fours. In many worlds, there were more - threads to other family, close loved ones - though rarely very many more than five or six between them. But no matter the circumstance, the four were interconnected. They were always, constantly connected._

_Even if they were living far away from each other, the threads stretched across time and space, connecting them all. The closer they were to each other, and especially the closer to the house, the brighter and stronger the threads. The house was a sort of amplifier, but it was also a sort of incubator. It ate chaos, but it also spewed chaos. It bound them together, tighter and tighter, safer from the wild randomness of their Universe; a Universe which revolved around them._

_There were some worlds where one or more of them had died, the house’s glow weaker, but soldiering on with the survivors. There were a few worlds where the house had been destroyed but the four remained, sustaining their world through their sheer existence, unprotected but alive. He suddenly understood that what had happened to them was a combination of these. They’d lost the house and Mike in one go, and it must have caused some sort of…rift. A wound the house and their own power couldn’t heal._

_He turned his attention to himself, and he saw them; four cords, leading into the darkness. One glowed a weak white, and when he followed it to its end, he found Neil, tidying up nervously, going over their collected notes, consumed with worry over the distance from his family, his daughter. If he focused on the thread, he could sense Neil through it. He could almost hear Neil’s thoughts in a vague, abstract way. Neil had five other threads leading away from him, not glowing at all, floating off into the darkness, three in one direction, two in another. One for each person he loved._

_Vyvyan looked to his other threads and found they simply ended, cut off in jagged edges as though ripped apart. Two languished black, floating listlessly into nothing, like the other threads attached to Neil. But the other, blacker still, seemed to bleed a dark ichor, dripping and throbbing with palpable, desperate loss. It cast about wildly as if searching for something it could not find. And he understood. He knew what had to be done. He knew how to find the other house, the other Rick. He scanned the multitude of lives before him until he found it – another thread, just as horrible and black as the one leading from his own chest, reaching into the darkness, reaching out for nothing. He took hold of its ragged end and followed to its source…_

Rick lay in bed, looking tiny and vulnerable. His eyes were sunken and bloodshot, his nose raw. He was little more than skin and bones, every rib and vertebrae visible. He wore only a pair of dirty skivvies, probably not changed for days. His hair was growing out, haphazard and ignored. He was curled into a ball atop the sheets, hugging his knees and staring into the wall, into nothing. He cried deep, sorrowful gulps, a raw, primal sound.

“You’d hate me so much if you saw me like this!” he choked out through his tears, to the empty room. Vyvyan immediately wanted to contradict him, but it was clear he was still invisible, inaudible. He’d followed the thread, but he hadn’t got there - not really. He looked on feeling helpless, remembering the way Rory’s arm had passed right through him.

“I know I was doing better,” Rick continued, “I was! But I can’t do this! It’s too hard, I don’t know how to do this!” He pulled the pillow from beneath his head and hugged it tight against him, crying into it. “Your side of the bed doesn’t smell like you anymore. I’ve forgotten which book on the second shelf was your favorite. I’m surrounded by little ghosts of you, but they’re fading away.”

_How long have I been dead here? Weeks? Months?_

It didn’t matter, he had to fix this somehow. He couldn’t save his Rick, but maybe he could still save this one. He tested the bed, and it was solid enough, just like the gravestone. He sat on it, between Rick’s curled legs and arms, and watched him closer. It hurt to see him hurt. Out of instinct, he reached out to stroke Rick’s cheek.

He made contact, _actual contact_ , and ever so faintly, he could feel Rick’s skin under his fingertips, feel the wetness of his tears. But then the spell was broken and his fingers fell through Rick’s head.

Rick gasped and lifted his head, searching the room with wide eyes.

“…Vyvyan?”

_He felt it._

“It’s me poof, I’m here, please don’t cry.”

Rick lay his head back down and let out a shuddering sigh. It seemed he still couldn’t hear him.

“I’m imagining things. I’m losing my bloody mind.”

“You’ve been barmy the entire time I’ve known you, poof,” Vyvyan smirked at him sadly.

“…What an odd thing memory is. I really thought I felt you there for a moment…”

“You did,” Vyvyan said, plaintive and frustrated. He’d done it once, could he do it again?

He reached out, concentrating hard, and tried to stroke Rick’s hair. But it was as if Rick wasn’t even there.

_It’s as if I’m not even there. Because I’m not. I’m asleep, or I’m dead, or whatever I am. If only I could follow the thread when I’m…_

The final piece of the puzzle clicked, and he was simultaneously overwhelmed by the truth of it and embarrassed by its obvious nature. He leaned over and kissed Rick on the temple, no longer concerned with whether he actually made contact. Fortunately, he did.

“Just wait a bit longer, poof,” he said, and kissed him again, “I’m coming home.”

He stood and left the room, one more thing to do before going back to the garden and testing his hypothesis.

Hours later, bolstered by the strange experience that morning, Rick managed to drag himself out of bed long enough to take a nice, warm bath. He’d just stood and picked up his towel when he saw the finger-writing on the mirror, the condensation clinging around the scrawled, familiar handwriting.

_GO OUTSIDE YOU LAZY BASTARD_

He stared at it a moment, stunned. Then he let out a surprised laugh that transitioned into more laughter - the first time he’d laughed in months. (In three months, eight days, and ten hours, in fact - he’d been keeping track.) He cried through his laughter, holding the towel to his chest. Both laughter and tears died down and he gave the mirror a grateful smile.

“Fine,” he said to the mirror, “You win, like always. I’ll go for a walk, if it’ll make you happy. Only promise you’ll haunt me again sometime.”

There was no answer, but that was all right. For the first time in a long time, _Rick_ was all right, if only in this moment.

He steamed the mirror up every day until the words faded. By the time they did, he was greatly improved; closer than ever to the person he’d been before his world had shattered.

*****

**Day ???**

“I know what to do,” Vyvyan said, sitting bolt upright and startling Neil considerably. He’d drifted off after they’d spent hours spent trying to decode their visions, and Neil was letting him sleep a bit - it was the first real sleep he’d had in days. But Neil was most surprised by his tone - he was animated, almost excited.

“What? What is it?”

“I know how to get back. Well, how to get to the place where we’re dead, the other house. We’ve been thinking about it all wrong - we’ve got to get there from _here_ , while we’re _awake_. It won’t work any other way. But I think I know how to follow the threads.”

He explained the things he’d seen, the infinity of their lives, the nature of their reality. He explained the threads, and what happened when he followed Rick’s.

“And see, that’s what we’ve got to do. We’ve got to walk through the gate and reach for the threads. I’ve got to reach for Rick’s and Mike’s and Rory’s, and you’ve got to reach for Mike’s and Rick’s and Summer’s and Meadowlark’s and Éowyn’s. It’s the only way - we’ve got to mend the connections, make that world whole again. Ours is already gone, what’s left is fading, but if we can make it there, it’ll fix everything. Everything will go back to normal!”

Neil watched him with increasing skepticism; it sounded as if Vyvyan had completely lost his mind. He sounded manic, crazed.

“But what if you’re wrong? What happens then?”

Vyvyan watched him, eyes wild, his face just on the edge of some sort of dark glee.

“Then we die. We make it home, or we die. That’s the choice. The only choice.”

Neil sighed, “And the only chance we’ve got.” He stood and took one last look at the shelter, both their savior and their prison.

“All right,” he said, resigned to either outcome, “Let’s go.”

*****

Vyvyan and Neil stood in front of the garden gate. They were surrounded by the black, writhing nothingness, the garden slipping further and further into darkness the closer they got to the fence. Vyvyan took a deep breath, nodded at Neil, and opened the gate.

Rather than the same darkness, the space behind the gate was a bright haze - the haze they’d been surrounded by at first. Neil watched Vyvyan with trepidation, but Vyvyan looked confident, so Neil looked ahead, into the haze. The two took one last pause, then stepped through the gate, together.

_The moment he crossed the threshold, Vyvyan felt that same unraveling feeling, the sensation of coming apart on a molecular level. He did his best to concentrate on the idea of the threads, and he became strongly aware of his own. He felt Neil through the thread connecting them, and he tried to send encouragement along it. He kept hold of the concept of the threads as he looked for the one he’d found before, Rick’s thread. His concentration landed on it, and he pictured it alongside his own. In his mind’s eye, they moved toward each other - and suddenly they slammed together, as if they were magnetized. The black ends met and twined - and in an instant, two threads were one. The thread glowed bright, thrumming with endless energy, revitalized. Vyvyan felt a similar, if weaker, sensation as the other threads merged with Mike and Rory, as Neil’s own threads merged. The glow intensified. It was brilliant, all-consuming. There was nothing but white…_

*****

They were standing on the street, in front of the house. _In front of the house_ , not in the garden. It was the middle of the day, and all was quiet on the street. Normal. Pleasant. They looked at each other and realized they’d been…reset somehow. The scruffy beards that they’d each begun to grow were gone, and they were dressed in clothes lost in the bombing - the clothes they usually wore. Vyvyan’s tri-hawk was in perfect shape. Neil’s ankh pendant, lost in the rubble, hung from his neck once again. The scrapes and bruises from their ordeal were gone. They were…fine. Absolutely fine. They stared at each other for a long moment, shocked that it had actually worked. Or at least, it seemed to, anyway.

They looked around the street for a bit longer before approaching the door, cautiously. Neil almost knocked on it, before realizing how silly that was and simply turning the knob. They each stepped through the door in wonderment. Here was the entryway, the wardrobe, the stairs. Here was the sitting room, the kitchen. Everything whole, and where they expected it to be. They were _home_. Everything looked right, everything _felt_ right. Mike was even sitting at the table, hidden behind his newspaper, like always.

“You took your sweet time. Did they have any or not?”

Neil and Vyvyan looked at each other, confused. Mike lowered his newspaper, half-glancing in their direction.

“Rick, are you even listening to-”

He did a double-take and the paper fell from his hands. With a shaking hand, he slowly removed his sunglasses, revealing shocked, wide eyes.

“…No…it couldn’t be…”

“…Well, it is,” Neil said, “…Surprise!” He waved.

An expression crossed Mike’s face neither had ever seen before. Mike watched them in genuine awe, standing slowly, leaning onto the table as though he was afraid it would disappear.

He approached them, staring, mouth moving but making no sound, until he finally managed a shocked, “My god…”

“…No. Only your subordinates,” Vyvyan said, and Neil felt instant relief - even if it was subdued, that was the first time he’d sounded anything like himself in days.

“Vyv…oh christ, Vyv it’s really you, isn’t it?”

Vyvyan shrugged. Mike did something that surprised everyone, including himself - he grabbed Vyvyan and hugged him. Tight.

“Jesus Christ almighty, I can’t believe it. I can’t believe it! Vyvyan Basterd, in the flesh, back from the fucking dead!”

Vyvyan stiffened on instinct when Mike first wrapped his arms around him. But after only a few moments, he sank into the hug, hugged back, and closed his eyes.

“It’s good to see you too, Mike,” he said, and Neil was happy to hear the tiniest hint of emotion in his voice.

*****

“And suddenly, we were standing in the street, just outside,” Neil said, finishing up the story they’d been trading back and forth. The three sat at the kitchen table, Neil and Vyvyan filling Mike in on everything they’d been through, everything they’d learned. Vyvyan had avoided a lot of details - he was nearly back to monosyllabic words before Neil took up the part about Rick’s death. Neil finished the story from there, Vyvyan staring uncomfortably into the empty fireplace, fidgeting, distant. Mike listened intently, and when Neil finished up, he released a tensely-held breath.

“What a story,” he said, bewildered, “I’d never believe it if I didn’t have two dead men in my kitchen telling it to me.”

The front door opened, and they all looked toward it. Rick walked through, carrying grocery bags in both arms. He’d been doing the shopping. It was a bizarre sight; Rick, his face neutral and somewhat bored, carrying the bags casually and quietly, with little effort. Neither Neil nor Vyvyan had ever seen him do such a menial task without heaps of complaint and melodrama. Vyvyan stood slowly as Rick turned to close the door - he hadn’t noticed them yet.

“Well I had to go to _three_ different Tescos until I found one that had any in stock, but I-”

He stopped in his tracks as he looked into the kitchen - at Vyvyan, standing in front of the table, staring at him like a dying man watches an oasis in a desert. Rick stared back, frozen for a few seconds.

Then he dropped the bags and fell into a dead faint.

Vyvyan moved toward him, feeling as though he were wading through thick syrup. He knelt by Rick’s side and lifted him, propping him against the entryway frame, touching him with cautious reverence.  He brushed his hand down the side of Rick’s face, his throat, his arm - as if he were trying to make sure he was really there.

_Is it you? Are you really my Rick?_

Rick came to, and his eyes focused on Vyvyan. His mouth dropped open, and he reached a hand up to Vyvyan’s face, performing the same reality test, brushing his cheek, his hair, each star on his forehead.

Vyvyan inspected Rick’s right arm, turned it over - revealing the tattoo of Ursa Minor, right where it was supposed to be. Half the symbol of their mutual pledge, their ultimate commitment. _I promise to stay with you for as long as you'll have me. I promise to protect you for as long as I'm able. And I promise to love you for the rest of my life._ He traced the shape with his finger, his lower lip beginning to shake. He looked back up at Rick, into the eyes already welling up - and the dam finally broke. Vyvyan crumpled into tears, pulling Rick to him and burying his face into Rick’s shoulder. He clung to him, desperately, curling into Rick’s lap as he escalated to sobs, loud and anguished. Rick clung back and cried along, squeezing Vyvyan so tight it actually hurt a little.

Neil and Mike slipped quietly away, into the cellar, unnoticed.

Vyvyan’s tears intensified. He was hysterical now, completely unable to stop, completely unable to let go of Rick for even an instant.

“I’m sorry,” Vyvyan wailed, more tears than words, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry…”

Rick had no idea what he meant, but it really didn’t matter at all. He wrapped a hand around the back of his neck, ran the other down his back. He swallowed his own tears and simply held Vyvyan tight, a steady rock for Vyvyan to cling to.

“Shhh,” he whispered into Vyvyan’s ear, “It’s all right. I’ve got you, it’s all right.”

“I tried! I tried so hard but it wasn’t enough and I lost you and it was my fault and I’m sorry!”

Rick really couldn’t even understand most of that, Vyvyan was crying too hard, but he’d heard “I tried” and “I’m sorry” and he squeezed him tighter.

“I know, love, I know. Shhh, it doesn’t matter, you’re here. I don’t know how or why, but you’re here, and it’s all right,” Rick began crying again, tears of overwhelm and joy all at once, “It’s going to be all right now.”

Vyvyan’s sobs lessened, eventually devolving into whimpers. Rick didn’t let go, determined to do whatever he could to make sure Vyvyan was all right. Vyvyan finally stopped crying, and Rick savored the warmth of his hitched breath against his neck. He never thought he’d ever feel it again, and the feeling filled him with an odd combination of joy and heartbreak. Vyvyan was _here_ , Vyvyan was _alive_ …but he was hurting so much, more than Rick had ever seen him hurt. He wondered what could possibly have happened to put him in this state.

“I broke the second promise,” Vyvyan said, quiet, ashamed, begging for forgiveness, “I didn’t mean to, but I broke it.”

“No, love, no you didn’t! You never would, I know that. You weren’t able, that’s all.”

Rick thought he was talking about dying, about leaving him alone and heartbroken. But Vyvyan shook his head.

“No, there must have been more I could have done, I did everything wrong, I should have saved you, I failed you.”

“I refuse to believe that,” Rick said kindly, now entirely lost but trying to just go with the flow, “Whatever happened, I know you did everything you could. You never do anything less. And besides, it doesn’t matter now. You’re here now. You’re home.”

Vyvyan’s breathing slowed as Rick soothed him, the two sitting in silence until Vyvyan broke it with a whisper.

“I love you, Rick.”

“…I love you, Vyvyan,” Rick choked up once again at speaking Vyvyan’s name, after months of avoiding it, “So, so much.”

“Don’t go away…” he muttered sleepily, and Rick squeezed him.

“Never. Not ever, I promise.”

Vyvyan fell asleep, days of exhaustion finally catching up with him. Rick was trapped under him, but he really didn’t mind; he was with Vyvyan. This was all so unbelievable, but it was happening. He only hoped it would stay like this, that Vyvyan would stay.

Neil came out of the cellar and headed for the door, clearly eager to get to his other home. He paused when he passed them, looking at them with concern.

“Is he all right?”

Rick nodded, smiling at Neil, “I think we both are, mad as that sounds.”

Neil smiled back, and reached for the door.

“Neil?” Rick caught him just as he opened it.

“Yeah?”

“…I’m glad you’ve come back as well.”

Neil smiled wider, “Me too, Rick.”

And then Neil was gone, and Rick was perfectly content to sit there on the floor of the front hallway, holding the love he thought he’d lost forever, sleeping safe in his arms.

*****

The next day, Rick shaved his mohawk back in, explaining that he’d let it grow in because it reminded him too strongly of Vyvyan to keep, but that he really did prefer it. Two days later, Vyvyan’s car reappeared, whole and functional, in its usual spot in front of the house. Three days later, Vyvyan and Neil’s tombstones vanished from the cemetery. By the end of the week, the house and their lives had returned to status-quo. No one even seemed to remember that they’d been dead, that anything unusual had happened at all. It seemed no one retained any knowledge of the things they’d experienced, not even Mike.

No one, that is, except Vyvyan. He kept it to himself, and there were some days even he forgot it had happened. But a part of him remembered, kept the knowledge close.

And a month or so later, when the group gathered in the hospital waiting room to await the arrival of Meadowlark’s new baby, he noticed Éowyn staring at him, swinging her little legs under the plastic chair. When he made eye contact with her, she gave him a knowing, conspiratorial smile, wise beyond her years.

Vyvyan returned the smile and winked at her. He squeezed Rick’s hand, their fingers entwined nearly as tightly as their souls.

* * *


End file.
